As much as we like each other's company, after spending ten days together in the teeny tiny confines of our campervan, we decided to branch away from our nightly routine of wine (though more often than not hot chocolate!) and exceptionally early nights due to no power and light past 7 pm, and joined a kiwi experience bus to travel around the South Island. The Kiwi bus, subtle lime green in colour, provides a hop-on hop-off service around New Zealand. We met a really nice group of guys, and spent the next few weeks travelling around the rest of the South Island with them...

Kaikoura, a few hours North of Christchurch, was our first proper stop, and our first glimpse of snow capped mountains. With the sun shining and the seaside setting we had a beautiful introduction to the scenery in the South Island. The area is famous for whales and dolphins, due to its underground canyon providing a perfect feeding ground, so we went to have a little look. Sarah went whale watching, and was pretty lucky to see two sperm whales.. Absolutely ginormous, weighing three times more than the hefty boat we were on! Just as good were the (no exaggeration) thousands of dolphins we had swimming and jumping along the side of the boat, amazing to see. Jess ticked off a lifetime ambition and was lucky enough to swim with dolphins in the wild. Not just a few dolphins though, approximately 300 of them! We were told if you can hold your breath and spin and dive under the water, the dolphins will be more interested in you, so I took this challenge on, and with the water baby gene inherited from my Mum I tried my hardest to make a suitable prat of myself underwater, with massive reward - the dolphins swam around me, over and underneath me, it was incredible, a proper pinch yourself moment! We were also told to make as much noise as possible through your snorkel, but I'm sure that was more for the entertainment of the people on the boat!

En route to our next destination, our driver stopped off at an amazing little gem. A waterfall filled with hundreds of baby seal pups, playing, fighting and swimming in the river and pools below - incredible little view point!

The Abel Tasman national park set the bar high for the scenery that was to come. We stayed in a place called Kaiterteri, home to a famous golden beach, and acting as the gateway to the park. As the park is only accessible by boat, we took a water taxi in, getting to see the famous split apple rock and more of New Zealand's fur seals. The coastal path was set high in the trees, with uninterrupted views of the sea for miles and miles. We had a great days walk, and our lunch spot definitely provided some stiff competition for the others - a secluded beach, turquoise seas and no people in sight for hours! The park had a big focus on conservation, with the select few houses completely dependent upon solar power (and you also had to be lucky enough to own a boat to live there!)

Westport, unlike Chile which just felt male dominated, actually had an 80% male population, supporting the local coal mining and fishing industry. We stayed in a really cool hostel here, and had a great group BBQ, which was lucky as we can't honestly say the town had that much going for it, or not what we saw of it anyway (unless you wanted a 60 year old man wearing cowboy boots to buy you a drink.)

Lake Mahanipua and the infamous stopover at the 'poo pub' was next, pretty much a Kiwi bus stop for you to have a good night, as apart from a lake there wasn't much there. But it did give us an opportunity to put our refined fancy dress making skills to good use, and fathom some kind of costume from our backpacks - three years in Durham did pay off!

In order to get a bit of an education about New Zealand's countryside and history, we stopped at this bizzare museum come cafe that was covered in possum skins and sold road kill pies! We sat through one of the strangest/ funniest videos we've ever seen, which documented the methods used by crazy men to catch wild deer when the population became too many - jumping out of moving helicopters and tackling deer to the ground was a popular choice! Although New Zealand is supposed to be the land of a million sheep, the number of deer farms was definitely more noticeable to us, especially after visiting the museum, as we couldn't get this bizzare image of grown men leaping from helicopters out of our heads!

The impressive glacier that is Franz Josef was our next port of call. Another thing ticked off Sarah's wish list, as we had a spectacular helicopter ride up onto the glacier. We didn't quite have chance to get over the excitement generated by our mode of transport when it landed on the amazing white and blue ice. We strapped on our crampons and spent the next three hours hiking and climbing over the massive folds of ice, with our guide hacking us steps with his pick axe. We slid our way through crevasses not much wider than ourselves, but at least 15 feet tall, through tunnels and into ice caves, all naturally created by the movement of the ice. It was shocking to learn this glacier had retreated a staggering five metres since 2008, with this pattern set to continue unless drastic changes are made to the climate cycle. So if this is on your hit list, you need to get in there quick! Although our hike seemed to come to an end too quickly we couldn't be too disappointed, as we had the helicopter ride back to look forward to, and this time with front seats :) This amazing day continued as we enjoyed a relaxing few hours in a local glacial geothermal pool - definitely one of our highlight days!

The drive to Lake Wanaka provided some of the most beautiful scenery to date. The mirror reflection of the mountains against the lake were truly stunning, just like in the postcards. Yet again we were very lucky with the weather, so Jess couldn't use the excuse of too many clouds to pull out of the sky dive she had signed up to (and worried about ever since). But when it came down to it, she absolutely loved it, and was a bit chuffed with herself, considering she is always the one holding the bags at fairgrounds! The 45 second free fall was amazing, definitely the nearest you can imagine getting to the sensation of flying, and all in such a beautiful setting, another pinch yourself moment!

The adrenaline and party capital of New Zealand, Queenstown, was where we spent our final full week. With a focal point lake, snow capped mountains, fir trees, wooden lodges and numerous pubs selling mulled wine, it had a really nice ski town feel. Sarah took the Kiwi phrase Kia Kaha (go hard) quite literally when she did New Zealand's biggest bungy jump, from an impressive 134 metres! It was so good, but over too quickly! I'd been thinking the 8 second free fall would feel quite lengthy whilst hurtling through thin air towards the bottom of a ravine, but quite the opposite, and now I'm desperate to do it again! Queenstown provided us with some good nights out - an ice bar experience, and cocktails served in teapots at the locally renowned World Bar (which burned down in the week we were there, so we might have even made it onto New Zealand news!) Another Queenstown tradition which we fully embraced was the Ferg Burger, recommended by many, they really were yummy! Unfortunately we didn't have time to make our way through the entire menu in a week, so we'll have to go back someday to complete the task. We learned through experience to get in the queue early for our free hostel dinners, to avoid getting just plain rice, which does not taste good with beans. In our last few days 'winter arrived', and we got to see Queenstown covered in snow, so for those of you asking if we are tanned, I can assure you with minus degrees and a good few centimetres of snow, we are most definitely not!

Our final leg in New Zealand took us to Christchurch, where the horrific impacts of the 2010 and 2011 earthquakes were much more noticeable than either of us had predicted. In the centre there were vast empty spaces where buildings used to be, cracks in the ground, and rubble everywhere. It was so void of people and buildings, giving it quite an eerie atmosphere. We found the experience quite sobering, to see the impacts of a disaster in such a developed country, especially when we learned about the wide reaching impacts on the community. But as we were there it had been 1000 days since the quake, and the evidence of rejuvenation and attempts to rebuild were very evident, planning to return the town to its previous character.

Just before flying out to Australia we had a very welcomed stay with a Fidler family friend in the countryside just outside Christchurch. Lovely to see a friendly face, and even better to see a normal non-bunk bed and a washing machine! Thanks again Doreen.

After a month in New Zealand we feel as though we've seen so much of what the country has to offer. The lack of people has definitely surprised us, every place we visited was smaller than we were expecting, the roads quieter, and the panoramic moments were hardly ever disturbed by other tourists. Considering we visited in the start of winter, we were incredibly lucky with the weather, which has shown New Zealand at its best. The scenery has been truly stunning, we've indulged in some very memorable activities, and met some great people and friendly locals during our travels, all in all making our experience in New Zealand a brilliant one!